Kemco at GDC 2019: Legend of the Tetrarchs and the Long History of the Studio

Gamezebo was at GDC this year, catching up with our favourite mobile games developers. We managed to get some time in with Kemco, the prolific team behind many mobile JRPGs. It was a lovely meeting, during which we discussed its …

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Gamezebo was at GDC this year, catching up with our favourite mobile games developers. We managed to get some time in with Kemco, the prolific team behind many mobile JRPGs.

It was a lovely meeting, during which we discussed its latest release, Legend of the Tetrarchs, and its long history developing games that charts all the way back to the NES era.

Legend of the Tetrarchs actually launched during the show. It takes place in a world in which people are mutating into monsters after the holy sword protecting them goes missing. So it’s up to you – along with four ancient heroes – to find that sword and put a stop to all of the chaos.

As is standard with Kemco games, Legend of the Tetrarchs riffs off classic JRPGs – in this instance those games that launched on the SNES. The pixelated visuals are a joy to behold and we always love a turn-based battle system.

Legend of the Tetrarchs Riffs on Classic SNES JRPGs

The battle system has received some modern trimmings to suit the mobile platform though. For example, you can automate battles if you just want to skip through the easy stuff and take over during boss battles. Though we were initially sceptical, we used this more than we’d like to admit during our playthrough.

There’s also a massive world to explore that’s bursting at the seems with treasure. Hunting those shinies down actually serves a huge purpose here too, as you earn new statistical bonuses and perks every time you find a trinket.

Along the way, you’ll pick up new allies too. In total, there are 10 allies to join up with – each of which has its own fighting style. Building a party out of them is a core battle strategy.

Legend of the Tetrarchs is chock full of content, including a single player storyline to beat, side quests to complete, battles to be had, and treasure to be found. You can grab it right now on the App Store or Google Play – the links to which are at the top of this article.

We also Learned a Lot About the History of Kemco – Including its Previous Success with Top Gear Games

We also discussed the history of Kemco as a studio, and were pretty astounded to learn that it had actually started way back in 1984. Kemco released numerous games on the NES, Game Boy, SNES, Game Boy Advance, PlayStation, N64, PS2, GameCube, and Xbox.

Oddly enough, before its mobile years, Kemco was probably most well known for its Top Gear games. That’s pretty mad when you consider that most mobile gamers simply associate the company with JRPGs.

We’d like to take a moment to thank Kemco for its time at GDC and wish it all the best in its future endeavours!

Head of Editorial
Glen has over a decade's worth of experience in gaming journalism, writing for Pocket Gamer, Pocket Tactics, Nintendo Life, and Gfinity. When he's not badgering everyone about the dangers of passive text, you can probably find him playing Wild Rift.